Dum-dums run the world.

I walked in and my desk was a miasma of papers, boxes, old coffee cups, baby pictures, food wrappers. My computer had been unplugged and disassembled, the monitor was shoved to the wall and the secretary's huge LCD screen took its stead. There were boxes and unopened mail on absolutely every surface in the office. Walking back into work today was a quick descent into the stagnation and depression that fills me in that job. There won't even be any kids to take my mind off things for another two weeks. It is hard, I kept hearing my voice say in my head, to work for people that you have precisely no respect for. I am tired. At this point it is 10 AM and I am praying for my pager to go off so that I can wisk myself back to the life that thrills me.

And after the eight hours I find myself sitting on mom and dad's porch sucking down a rum and coke. I remembered sitting in that very spot three years ago after a different yet equally bad day. "You've got the Jindra spirit, kid," I remember my dad saying to me. There was and still is no greater compliment. Things will get better because you have already decided that they will.

Today I overheard Lynn say from her office, "geez, you really accumulate a lot of stuff in a desk you've had for ten years." My spirit crumpled and felt like wet wool and just then St. Florian is listening to this dialogue in my head, now I'm sure of it my pager toned us out to an alarm on campus and I was out the door before anyone could figure out where the beeps were coming from. I pulled up and donned my gear and was instantly transformed to the indestructible Emily who stands fifty feet tall and carries a stern, intent expression.

The fortune in my cookie after dinner tonight said, "you are transforming yourself into someone who is certain to succeed." I know, I remember. Just help me feel it in my bones when I'm at my "real" job. My way; my way or the highway!